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Should be simple.....DSR7000 unhacked 6.2

I've done a lot of reading the past few days (Plain Bill, ADH and Cheer's guide) as well as a ton of the posts in the newbie section and I still seem to be missing somthing. Here's the hardware details:

I bought the 2nd 7000 as a test unit to play with so I wouldn't take down the "production" unit knowing this whole process could take a while (for a noob) and knew I'd be in the doghouse if I took the livingroom Tivo down for more than a few hours. This is what I've done thus far:

Copied stock drive to new drive and put in 2nd 7000. Started up and did a "clear and delete everything" Unit comes up to the setup screens. Cool, backup and restore seems to have went well.

This is what I'm fuzzy on/seem to be having problems with:

I've downloaded both the Weeknees ISO and the PTV freebie, as well as the 3.1.5 kernel (readme said it had killhdinitrd applied already) and the $5 PTV boot disk with the kernels. I made a multisession CD(s) so the iso and the kerenels were on the CD. Boot and do the following: (I've done this several different times)
bootpage -p
result is "root=/dev/hda7"

copy and gzip -d vmlinux.px in /var

issue "dd if=/var/vmlinux.px of=/dev/hda6"
and just to be sure also "dd if=/var/vmlinux.px of=/dev/hda3"
I get an output some like (can't remember a this point, brain shutting down)
1+1 in
1+1 out

Created rc.sysinit.author in /dev/hda7/etc/rc.d and added "/bin/bash</dev/ttyS2>/dev/ttyS2&"

Installed the drive (assuming everything was OK) and hooked my serial cable up (left over from old S1SA - Turbonet and early version of Tivoweb) and no serial output during boot and certainly no bash access. Bummer. Pull the drive and recheck. "bootpage -p" shows only "root=/dev/hda7" although rc.sysinit.author is still located in /etc/rc.d (assuming that means 3.1.5 kernel install was sucessful). I'm sure I'm missing something simple and obvious. I'm not looking for a quick answer, I'd like to be pointed in the right direction - I'm trying to learn. It seems most of the posts (almost all) deal with unsleepering a previous unit and not just a 6.2 hack but I think I got everthing right. If not I'm sure the problem is a lack of understanding of the commands but my trusty Linux Bible is helping that along, especially with vi (who the hell thinks those command make sence?).

What I'm trying to get is just a bash prompt now. Eventually HMO and MRV.

Be gentle....

Last edited by CheapyMcCheap; 11-15-2005 at 11:06 AM.
Reason: Better title

I'm assuming you executed the bootpage -P command with the Tivo drive in your PC. That being the case you used the wrong convention in your command line. The basic command is correct but you need to replace the following at the end of the quotes: change "/dev/hda" to "-C /dev/hdx" where x = the designation for the Tivo drive in your PC (e.g., secondary master would be /dev/hdc).

Please don't PM me or any other members looking for personal assistance. You'll do better by posting (after you've exhausted the search feature, of course) and taking advantage of the collective expertise of the membership instead of a single individual that may or may not be able to help you. Thank you and enjoy your stay at DDB!

Thanks for the response captin. Staying up until 3:00 AM having fun with tivo seemed like a good idea last night, but now.........

Yes, all the linux commands listed were performed while the drive was connected to the PC (since I can't seem to get bash access functional, but with your help I think I understand why). I've been running the PC with only the tivo drive connected to the pri IDE controller and only a CD ROM on the secondary IDE controller. Since I do most of this late night after work I wanted to minimize /dev/hdX confusion so there's only one.

Gotcha, -C creates the bootpage file, right? Again, it appears the command I used was intended to be ran on a pre-hacked unit that would have had some bootpage file (again, right?). Please correct if this is way off base. Sorry if I'm being overly inquisitive, I just want to make sure I get at least a basic understanding of what I'm doing and why.

There's no "bootpage file"--it's an actual section on the HD (in sector 0 or 1 IIRC). All TiVo drives have something there, the command you're using is to put what you want there. The command you listed before (without -C ...) is for use in the TiVo to change the bootpage parameters.

bootpage -P changes the bootpage command to whatever you specify between the quotes

The -C flag at the end of the command line is only used when the Tivo drive is mounted in a PC.

The current location of the Tivo drive must be specified using the /dev/hdx statement. If it's in your PC use the -C flag and the correct location of the drive. If it's in the Tivo then leave off the -C flag and use /dev/hda for the drive location.

Please don't PM me or any other members looking for personal assistance. You'll do better by posting (after you've exhausted the search feature, of course) and taking advantage of the collective expertise of the membership instead of a single individual that may or may not be able to help you. Thank you and enjoy your stay at DDB!

Worked like a champ. And after dinner I looked around more threads and found several that had the info about modifing the bootpage if the drive was in the PC - figures, never when you want it.

Back when I hacked my SA S1 box it was standard practice to put all files/hacks on partition 9 instead of 4 or 7 to prevent software updates from erasing everything. I'm assuming that isn't the case these days as everything I've seen thus far refers to 4 and/or 7 for destination of hack data. Is there a suggested destination or is it personal prefrence?

I see my "setting path" just before getting the bash prompt but if I "echo $PATH" I'm missing /hack/bin. I can "export PATH=$PATH:/hack/bin" from bash and everythings fine. I'm sure I've done something incorrect so please point me in the right direction. Let the learning begin.

I see my "setting path" just before getting the bash prompt but if I "echo $PATH" I'm missing /hack/bin. I can "export PATH=$PATH:/hack/bin" from bash and everythings fine. I'm sure I've done something incorrect so please point me in the right direction. Let the learning begin.

I hadn't but your statement leads me to believe it does matter. If it's not obvious, I'm not very familure with linux, just the very basic stuff. I assumed that the order didn't matter based on 1) - Plain Bills post and 2) DOS experience (Iknow, I know). I'll try changing, but even if the order does make a difference should the statement "export PATH=$PATH:/hack/bin:." worked? Collecting the current PATH and appending /hack/bin to it right? That didn't work either. I'll make the following change "export PATH=/bin:/sbin:/tvbin:/hack/bin:." and do some more reading. If I'm still off track please give me a nudge in the right direction. Thanks.

I believe Jamie's point was that you started running the bash program prior to adding '/hack/bin' to the $PATH. Thus bash didn't know about '/hack/bin'. My $PATH is set before anything else in .author.